Pages

Saturday, July 30, 2011

The Glassheart Chronicles anthology is now available on Kindle and Nook! This is a collection of stories from authors Courtney Cole, Amy Jones, Fisher Amelie, Nicole Williams, Tiffany King, Wren Emerson, and myself. The stories are all drawn from our paranormal series--my contribution, "The Monster in the Garden," looks at one of Jenny Morton's past lives.

Friday, July 29, 2011

I'm about to wind down the promoting thing for a little while longer (not that I've been doing much this summer...lazy me) while I edit Alexander and also continue writing my ultra-secret next book.

Ashley from Bookish Brunette somehow tricked me into doing some events on her blog, though. She's offering a paperback giveaway now, and there will be a couple more things over the next few weeks. Stop by her blog to enter! Thanks, Ashley!

Also, check out this new post about The Glassheart Chronicles from Courtney Cole, the author who's put the anthology together! It will be released Aug. 1 (two days!) and include a special past-life short story about Jenny (you know, from Jenny Pox?) along with contributions from several great paranormal authors, each featuring characters from their main series. Am I only linking this because Courtney calls me "a better looking Stephen King"? No, I'm not.

Monday, July 25, 2011

If you missed the celebration on Friday, there is still time to enter to win ebooks of Jenny Pox and Tommy Nightmare. You can enter up to three times by commenting on each of the three blogs. Here are the links to the 'cover reveal' posts:

Thanks again to Danny, Pushy, Heather, Karen and Jenny for hosting this fun event! It's been great to hear from so many people about the cover for the third book.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Tomorrow is one year since I injected Jenny Pox into the Kindle store, from which it spread virally, infecting the world like an epidemic...well, you get the metaphor.

To celebrate, the awesome ladies at Bewitched Bookworms, Slowest Bookworm and Supernatural Snark are each hosting a cover reveal/guest post from me on their blogs. They'll be giving out some ebook party favors, we'll be wearing our digital party hats, we'll have a whole cake of fun...well, you get the metaphor.

So, tune in (?) tomorrow (Friday, July 22) to see the cover for the third Jenny Pox books, and some of that other stuff I just talked about. We'll have special guests, too. Like you, for example.

Here are the blog hosts for tomorrow:

Special thanks to Danny and Pushy Fox at Bewitched Bookworms for coming up with this idea and putting it all together!

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Danny is the third Bewitched Bookworm to review Jenny Pox - happily, she liked it, too. See her review here. (You can also see the first Bookworms review, by Heather and Pushy Fox. This was back in October 2010, and there's a lovely comment from super-bestselling author Amanda Hocking. While we're at it, don't forget The Slowest Bookworm's review of Jenny Pox from back in October, too.) The Bewitched Bookworms have a fun blog, and these ladies have Ph.D's in fields like chemistry and biology--proving the old saying that "smart girls love Jenny Pox."

But there's other big news today. Helix is one of the first books I put out on Kindle back in 2009, when I had no budget and only idiots expected to make money self-publishing. This year, it's been redesigned with a cover from Phatpuppy Art.

Recently, I had Russell Phillips of The Creative Source give Helix an overhaul. This included a full copy edit and redesigning the typography. For the paperback, he did some nifty full-wrap cover art and fully formatted the interior pages to give everything a fresh, crisp look. If you're an indie author and you're ready to invest in a professional-grade book, I'd recommend Russell--he's highly skilled, fast, and passionate about making books the best they can be.

The upgraded Helix is now live on Amazon (paperback or Kindle), Nook, and Smashwords, so this is a great time to try the book!

Also, Russell decided to design a logo for me, so I'll be adding that here and there as I go. It looks like this:

I think it's pretty neat to have a logo for my books! Now make some comments so I don't feel lonely.

Saturday, July 9, 2011

July 22 is Jenny Pox's one-year publication anniversary. To celebrate, we'll be revealing the cover for the third Jenny Pox book on three blogs: Bewitched Bookworms, Supernatural Snark and The Slowest Bookworm. The book itself should be out in September, if all goes well. So that should be a fun day!

Friday, July 8, 2011

If American public schools teach one thing, it's that you should wait. Sit quietly and wait for instructions. Wait to be told what's true, and don't ask too many questions. Wait until you're called on. And so on.

But, here's the thing: the waiting game gets you nowhere. Nobody is going to provide you with what you want, and certainly nobody's going to figure out what you REALLY want except for you. There are plenty of people in the world who will tell you what to do, but it typically won't be for your benefit.

You have to keep moving forward, trying new things, and taking risks. Waiting doesn't get you anywhere but old and disappointed. Innovations in the arts, sciences, and even business require striking out into unfamiliar territory, screwing up, crashing and burning. Then starting over. Success is not guaranteed. But nothing will happen if you're waiting instead of acting.

Thursday, July 7, 2011

The Glassheart Chronicles will be a collection of short stories from YA paranormal authors, with each of us contributing a new story with characters from our existing novels. My contribution gives a glimpse into one of Jenny's past lives. While the book won't be out until August, you can add it your Goodreads shelf today, if you're into Goodreads:

Saturday, July 2, 2011

During July, you can get 25% off Jenny Pox, Tommy Nightmare and Helix as part of the Smashwords site-wide promotion sale thingy. Smashwords provides ebooks in all formats, so if you change readers (like from a Nook to a Kindle) you don't have to re-buy the books in a new format. Just enter coupon code SSW25 at checkout to receive the discount.

You can also download Stacey Benefiel's book Day of Sacrifice for free as part of the promotion!

In other news, my beard is huge because I've been off work for weeks. And the baby said his first word: "Waaah!"